Schlocktoberfest XI – Day 8: Sleepwalkers

SchlocktoberfestXI

Sleepwalkers (1992)

Trailer:

*Spoilers Throughout*

What’s This About: A mother and son, whom happen to be a rare breed of vampire called Sleepwalkers must find female virgins to feed on to survive. Unfortunately there’s only one virgin in town. And they are downright terrible at hunting for food.

This was a left-over entry from Shlocktoberfest VII: Seventh Schlock of a Seventh Schlock.

Here are some of my observations as I watched the film:

The movie opens with the definition of a Sleepwalker. But it’s not the one you’re thinking of which is someone who walks or moves in their sleep. Nope, it’s “Nomadic shape-shifting creatures with human and feline origins. Vulnerable to the deadly scratch of a cat, the sleepwalker feeds upon the life-force of virginal human females. Probable source of the vampire legend.” ~Chillicoathe encyclopedia of arcane knowledge, 1st edition 1884.
I’m going to just assume that most “vampires” or “sleepwalkers” were just uber creepy rapists that used this “disease” as an excuse to prey on women in the olden days.
I tried to look it up and the “Chillicoathe encyclopedia of arcane knowledge“ doesn’t even exist! It was all fucking made up!
MARK HAMILL!

Unfortunately, George stopped returning my phone calls.

That’s a lot of dangling pussy.
Less than 3 minutes in and there’s already a cat jump scare.
How many cat jump scares will this movie have I wonder? I’m going to say 9.
Did that corpse of that girl just scream at the cops when it jumped at them?
Hahaha. What is that illustration of a cat-woman with human breasts breast-feeding a human? Looks silly.

Directed by Mick Garris. I should stop this right now.
So here we have some shirtless dude listlessly looking at what looks to be a high school yearbook on a lazy afternoon in Indiana. He then starts to cut his arm with a small knife into a “T.” It’s for Tanya.
Oh, and the film is being cute by playing the classic rock instrumental “Sleep Walk” by Santo and Johnny. Clever!
Did they want that stray cat to get caught in the bear trap? Sure seemed so.
Now the dude is dancing with his mother. Like incredibly close. Uncomfortably close.
I guess Tanya could wait since this dude here is more interested in his own mom.
So interested in fact that their love-making is making neon lights and illuminating the whole room.
I sure do miss working at the movie theatre. Best job in the world.
Now we’re seeing Mädchen Amick dance in the theatre lobby to that top 40 hit in 1992: “Do You Love Me“ by the Contours.
Thanks to Mädchen Amick, I just learned how to type an umlaut with an “A!” Radical!
She really loves this song!
Seriously, this dance scene is going on way too long.
This movie theatre has a barrel at the concession stand. Besides looking awesome I’m wondering what’s in there? Beer, doubtful. Maybe Root Beer or Sarsaparilla!

Save me a slice of pie and a damn fine cup of coffee

Tanya was surprised that Charles knew her name. He said he knew her from class. He’s new in town and totally never registered to Tanya even though he’s brand new and in her class. And she’s flirting back with him right now so how does she not recognize him? Is she that dumb?
Hey! It’s Mr. Bueller!
Is that an Enya song? Ain’t nothing wrong with that!
The cat’s NOT out of that bag that that cop is holding!
So they did want to kill that cat with the bear trap earlier. This son and mother are the titular Sleepwalkers that the opening prologue told us about and they can die if they are even scratched by a cat. This is the plot. I wonder what substance Stephen King was on when writing this classic.*

*This screenplay written by King was not based on a preexisting book of his. It’s just an original screenplay from him.
Tanya Robertson? Tanya RobertSON? Tanya ROBERTSon? Hmmm.
Oh right, this incestuous family needs a virgin female to eat. That’s why Charles is trying to win over Tanya Roberts….son.
I just realized the mother is the Borg Queen. The son, Charles, played by Brian Krause I’ve never seen anything he’s been in. Always a good sign.
Otho!
Without even the slightest hesitation Otho whacks some jock on the hand with a ruler when he spots the jock trying to hand another girl in class a piece of paper. It wasn’t a folded cliché note either but an unfolded paper. Could’ve been anything. Sure it turns out to be a very lewd drawing of what the jock wants to do to the girl in a parked car but me thinks Otho reacted way too harsh for a public school teacher.

At least the dude is direct. And not a bad illustrator either.

During class, Charles, reads his story called “Sleepwalkers” about a mother and son who are constantly persecuted for their odd ways of life. Careful Charles, that could potentially be incriminating evidence.
Why are they called Sleepwalkers anyway if they are shape-shifting were-cats? What does the sleep walk aspect have to do with them? King just lazingly took the myth of Native American‘s Skinwalkers and changed the name it seems!
Charles corrects Mr. Otho by saying a box has 6 sides and not 4, humiliating him to the rest of the laughing class and the scene just ends. Remember moments earlier, Mr. Otho thrashed a kids knuckles for passing a piece of paper to another student. Maybe he was lenient because Charles is the new kid?
What fucking time period is this school in? In a new scene, we see another teacher grabbing another student by his ear lobe and waking him down the hall! I seriously thought this was the 90s. Now I’m second-guessing myself. But I’m pretty sure Tanya was listening and dancing to the Contours on a Walkman.
Tanya’s mom’s hobby is gravestone rubbings. While this isn’t that morbid (Tanya’s words) as it seems, what is weird is they are framed and hanging in the hallway by the bedrooms.
“I like rocks!” He seems dumber than a bag of rocks.
Wait a minute. Tanya’s mom is Mrs. Bueller! So Ferris Bueller’s parents are Tanya’s in this flick. Weird. Also I just learned that those two actors met and started dating during Ferris Bueller and later married. And now forced to act in every movie together as husband & life forever.
Charles is trying to impress Mrs. Bueller by saying he does gravestone rubbing too. So dumb.
Mr. Otho honks and flags down Charles while driving and Charles actually stops his car to chat with him. If I was Charles, I’d tell him to go fuck himself.
Mr. Otho threatens Charles and Charles rips Otho’s hand off and hands it back to him. Gotta hand it to him, it was a nice gore shot of the blood splattering on the windshield.

“Where you going round boy, we’re about to have some laughs!”

Charles morphs his face into a cat-like face and chases down Otho in the woods. Otho runs face first into a large tree and Charles then starts to eat him. I thought they only eat virgin girls?
And why are they cat-people if normal cats can kill them? Kinda strange. That’s like a Vampire dying after they get scratched or bitten by a normal bat.
Some African-American cop on the side of the road is playing with his pet cat, Clovis, in the squad car. While that’s not that odd, he’s basically telling Clovis to catch the dangling koosh ball and referring it as a “motherfucker.”
What is this late 80s hair band guitar solo song playing during this car chase between Charles and the cop? It’s so dated yet hilarious.
Charles just narrowly hit some school girl in a crosswalk. Not sure how he thinks he’s going to get away with that when he was initially just guilty of speeding. But Charles don’t give a fuck.
The cop pulls alongside Charles and tells him to pull over. Actually he tells him to “pull over, Motherfucker!” Nothing wrong with a little stereotyping I suppose.
Charles is acting all smug until he sees Clovis the cat and then hilariously shape-shifts his face into about 5-6 different cat monster faces in the worse CGI 1992 can muster.

This cop’s squad car is no match for Charles’ Trans Am!
For some supernatural reason Charles thinks real hard and makes him and his car disappear on the side of the road. The cop is baffled at how he lost the Trans Am but Clovis can see him still. Charles yells at Clovis: “stop looking at me you fucking cat!” This is ridiculous!
Wait, I spoke too soon. Charles reappears with a completely different car! This is quite the super power he has.
I was just to going to mention that despite Charles changing his vehicle (which I’m sure has all new valid registration) the cop actually saw his face but now Andy, the cop, is telling the story to his other cop buddies and he’s saying that because he shape-shifted he never got a good look of his face. He also states that Clovis didn’t like the guy. Top notch police work there Andy.
I haven’t asked this, because A. I know I’ll probably won’t get an answer and B. I’m afraid of the answer but why make this mother and son incestuous? Is there a point to them fucking? Maybe this and all the other weird shit was better fleshed out in the 3-hour directors cut.
The mother is STARVING! She literally is going to starve to death if they don’t get a virgin girl for her to eat. Why doesn’t she go out and try to get her own virgin instead of relying on her son to get the goods? And why are they only targeting ONLY THIS girl in particular?! Especially the one that Charles has the hots for? This flick could have a ton more excitement and gore if they have several scenes of Charles bagging other virgins for his mother. At the very least give us an explanation as to why the mother needs Tanya and only Tanya.
And Tanya is literally the best looking girl that we’ve seen in this school. There’s a slim chance that she’s still a virgin. We know Charles chose her because he likes her but is she the last virgin in that high school? Is every other teen girl in town a complete slut?
Oh come on, we already know how hot the mother and son are for each other, do we need more than one sex scene with them?!
Did Tanya’s mom lose her Vermont deal?

Well at this point nothing is much explained about the Sleepwalker lore or even the history of Charles and his mother. I don’t know if they are extremely old and have been living off the blood of virgins for centuries or they’ve only been at this game for a short while. Shit, we don’t even know if they are the only Sleepwalkers or there are others like them out there.
Tanya comes over to pick up Charles for a date and meets the mother. They actually exchange pleasantries. If the mother is starving and hellbent on eating Tanya, why isn’t she devouring her immediately? She actually allows her son to go on the date. This makes very little sense. Remember, she is fucking STARVING for virgin meat!
You know what makes a very romantic first date location? A cemetery. Boning in the boneyard.
“Your mother’s gonna wanna know some rubbing went on out here.” Oh Charles, your sexual innuendo is priceless!
Oh, he implied his penis right?
I’m disappointed at 2 things so far. One Mark Hamill most likely isn’t coming back since he was sheriff back in California in the opening and the movie now takes place in Indiana. And two, not enough cat jump scares.
Christ, Mick Garris is such a fucking hack.
I’m thinking Charles made the mistake of choosing the girl he really liked as the meal he and his mom choose for her to feed on.
When Charles French kisses Tanya some of that blue neon light shoots out of his mouth. What kind of magic or supernatural powers do these Sleepwalkers have. It’s all over the fucking place.
Charles just referred Tanya as lunch so the cat’s out of the bag so to speak.
“Peek-a-baby!” Peek-a-baby?!
Tanya just poked Charles’ eye with a corkscrew. Wait, why did two teens need a corkscrew for in their picnic? Did they actually bring wine?

Screw You!

So the film decided to shift tones now and is making Charles say stupid jokes like Freddy Krueger while getting his eyes gouged out and trying to attack Tanya. Fucking Mick Garris/Stephen King.
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that the magic that made Charles’ blue Trans Am turn into a red sports car wore off for some reason (seriously, this film is not explaining anything) and Andy spots it outside the cemetery gates. Andy and Clovis are on the case!
Welp, Andy is now dead. I hope you all didn’t get too attached to him.
“Cop Kebab!” Charles bad joke had the all the fire and fury in his delivery of “Garbage Day!“

But man, if you’re going to make these out-of-tone jokes at this movie’s expense at least make them make sense. Sticking one pencil into a cop’s ear doesn’t really make it a kebab, which by definition means more than one piece of food on a stick. You now what? This all doesn’t matter.
Oh wait. Andy miraculously survived having a fucking pencil fucking pierce his fucking brain.
Oh wait. He’s dead again when Charles casually and easily grabs Andy’s gun out of his hand and then shoots a very stunned and idiotic Andy.
Clovis the cat to the rescue!
Nice cat prop. Out-fucking-standing. The way Charles is wrestling the cat clawing at his face reminds me of Bela Lugosi fighting the octopus in Ed Wood.
Charles, now scratched and bit by Clovis, flees in his Trans Am. I guess he’ll die later?
Another thing that is never explained is why dozens of stray cats are gathering outside Charles’ house. Everytime we see their house there’s like 5 more cats just hanging out on the yard. I guess Charles is a regular pussy magnet.
Hahahaha. There’s occasionally a screaming cat sound effect off camera implying one just got killed by their traps. But it’s the most comically sounding cat scream you’ve ever heard.
Hey there’s the man himself—THE KING!
Is that Tobe fucking Hooper playing a forensics detective?
And is that Clive Barker?!

“Ya know, one of these days I feel I just want to write a YA novel.” “Yeah I hear ya. Do you have any coke on you?”

More out of place humor. At least it’s from King.
Does anyone know what Trans Am is even short for?
Hey it’s the actor that played Ted in Friday the 13th, Part 2 and Harold “Reptile” Sherpico from Just One of the Guys!
I demand to see Clovis drive the police car like Toonces the driving cat from SNL.

The Borg Queen hears police sirens approaching and makes the Trans Am disappear. If they already found the house that Charles Brady lives at, what’s the difference if the car is not there?
Now she makes both she and Charles disappear before the cops barge in. Again, their magic is so powerful and awesome yet I don’t know what’s the point.
I suppose making the whole house disappear is too much effort for these Sleepwalkers.
Ron Perlman! Weird that his cop character is just making an appearance now. Me thinks he’s also a Sleepwalker and in about 10 minutes there will be a lame twist that he helps Charles and the Borg Queen. Just a hunch.
I suppose since they are vampires who can magically disappear and change their automobile at will, you would think they wouldn’t struggle so badly at finding victims to eat. How hard is it to find a virgin anyway? Do they have to eat virgins at a certain age? Couldn’t a 6-year-old suffice? This is so dumb.
Why is this cop eating the Bueller’s dinner?
Somehow roses play a role in this movie but again, not explained yet. The corpse that Mark Hamill found in the beginning had a rose in the girls’ hair and Charles put a rose in Tanya’s hair on their first date before he attacked her. And now the Borg Queen smashed a vase full of roses in Mr. Bueller’s face when she went to Tanya’s house.
The cop who devoured the Bueller’s corn for dinner just tried to attack the Borg Queen but was easily pushed down like a duffel-bag full of dirty underwear.
Joe Dante? Why?
AND John Landis!?!
What, was Sam Raimi too busy to make a cameo too?
The Borg Queen just stabbed the cop in the back with a half-eaten corn cob! Boy did he get an earful! Sorry that was a very corny joke.

Shucks. This was an a-maizing kill actually.

I was dead wrong about Ron Perlman since he just tried to grab the Borg Queen but she bit his fingers off and broke his arm. Why was he in this? And they made his character stand out more so than the other cops, besides the corn-killed one anyway.
So now The Borg Queen has kidnapped Tanya in a cop car but stupid her she put her in the front seat and not the back where cops usually put criminals and can’t open the doors or windows and can’t escape.
For some reason, not explained of course, she takes Tanya back to her house to give to Charles. I can only assume so he can eat Tanya to regain his life-force.
Jesus, the song “Sleep Walk“ AGAIN?! It’s Charles’ favorite song according to his mother. That‘s like Dracula loving the song “Bela Lugosi‘s Dead.“
As if they have all the fucking time in the world, The Borg Queen makes Tanya and Charles dance.
So despite these Sleepwalkers having fangs and claws they “feed” on their victims by using that glowing neon light that comes out of their mouths. Why have fangs then?
Tanya pokes out Charles’ eyes which then kills him. But remember a half-hour ago when she poked his eye out with a corkscrew and it did virtually nothing to him?
I also forgot to mention that the Sleepwalkers are impervious to bullets.
In a stunt that should’ve been cooler, the sheriff throws a bear trap at the Borg Queen and it snaps closed on her head. But it barely did a thing to her.
But shortly thereafter she’s attacked by a few cats in the yard and she bursts into flames. Why flames? Why not?
Oh shit, wait, that was the finale? She just gets attacked by cats and dies in flames while saying that Tanya killed her son, “her only son.”
Damn, I didn’t make nearly enough cat jokes in this review. What a Cat-tastrophe!
Ha! Clovis gives the last cat jump scare! You go Clovis!
Take it away Enya!

Was it Entertaining:

Final Thoughts: I already knew I was in for a special treat watching a Mick Garris/Stephen King 90s movie starring virtually no one of consequence. I don’t know how this ranks with the King fans out there but I can’t imagine it‘s one of the better ones. Especially since this wasn’t a novel first but just a screenplay by King. If this film took its time to flesh out the lore of the Sleepwalkers and explain their quirky convoluted supernatural powers then maybe it would be more enjoyable. They also could’ve rethought the whole virgin idea since it painted them into a corner with only targeting that one girl. I dunno, it‘s really not worth the time analyzing this further.

Score: 3 Corn-cob Knives (out of 10)